Holyrood, and Flora with her high, selfless hopes and broken heart, and
the beloved Baron, bearing his lot "with a good-humoured though serious
composure." "To be sure, we may say with Virgilius Maro, 'Fuimus Troes'
and there 's the end of an auld sang. But houses and families and men
have a' stood lang eneugh when they have stood till they fall with
honour."

"Waverley" ends like a fairy-tale, while real life ever ends like a
Northern saga. But among the good things that make life bearable, such
fairy-tales are not the least precious, and not the least enduring.

INTRODUCTION

The plan of this edition leads me to insert in this place some account of
the incidents on which the Novel of Waverley is founded. They have been
already given to the public by my late lamented friend, William Erskine,
Esq. (afterwards Lord Kinneder), when reviewing the Tales of My Landlord
for the Quarterly Review in 1817. The particulars were derived by the
critic from the Author's information. Afterwards they were published in
the Preface to the Chronicles of the Canongate. They are now inserted in
their proper place.

The mutual protection afforded by Waverley and Talbot to each other, upon
which the whole plot depends, is founded upon one of those anecdotes
which soften the features even of civil war; and, as it is equally
honourable to the memory of both parties, we have no hesitation to give
their names at length. When the Highlanders, on the morning of the battle
of Preston, 1745, made their memorable attack on Sir John Cope's army, a
battery of four field-pieces was stormed and carried by the Camerons and
the Stewarts of Appine. The late Alexander Stewart of Invernahylewas one
of the foremost in the charge, and observing an officer of the King's
forces, who, scorning to join the flight of all around, remained with his
sword in his hand, as if determined to the very last to defend the post
assigned to him, the Highland gentleman commanded him to surrender, and
received for reply a thrust, which he caught in his target. The officer
was now defenceless, and the battle-axe of a gigantic Highlander (the
miller of Invernahyle's mill) was uplifted to dash his brains out, when
Mr. Stewart with difficulty prevailed on him to yield. He took charge of
his enemy's property, protected his person, and finally obtained him
liberty on his parole. The officer proved to be Colonel Whitefoord, an
Ayrshire gentleman of high character and influen